Korah's Rebellion Against Moses

(Book of Numbers 16:1 - 16:50)
Korah son of Izhar, the son of Kohath, the son of Levi, along with descendants of Reuben, Dathan and Abiram, sons of Eliab, and On son of Peleth, hatched a plot against Moses along with 250 prominent community leaders, all members of the assembly.  As a group, they confronted Moses and Aaron and rebuked them, "You assume too much!  The entire community of Israel has been chosen to be holy by Jehovah and he is with all of us.  Why do you set yourselves up as being greater than the rest of Jehovah's community?"

Moses responded to their words by prostrating himself.  He then addressed Korah and his followers: "Tomorrow morning Jehovah will make known who is with him and who is holy and whom he allows to approach him.  The one he chooses, he will allow to approach him.  You, Korah, and your followers prepare your censers.  Tomorrow light fires in them and burn incense before the altar.  Then we will see who it is that Jehovah chooses as holy.  It's you Levites who assume too much!”

Moses said this as well to Korah: "Now listen, you Levites!  Isn't it enough for you that the god of Israel has single you out from the community of Israel to allow you to approach his altar and serve in his Tabernacle, to stand before your people and minister to them?  He has allowed you and your fellow Levites to approach his altar -- but now you demand the priesthood as well?  It is in opposition to Jehovah that you and this company have gathered.  What's wrong with Aaron that you object to him?"

Moses summoned Dathan and Abiram, the sons of Eliab, but they responded, "We won’t come!  Isn't it enough that you have brought us out of a land flowing with milk and honey to die in the desert, but must you lord it over us?  What’s more you haven't brought us into a land flowing with milk and honey or given us a new homeland of fields and vineyards.  Are you trying to pull the wool over these men's eyes?  No, we will not come!"

Moses was enraged and complained to Jehovah, "Refuse their offerings!  I haven't taken so much as one donkey from them or harmed a hair on their heads."

Moses told Korah, "You and your followers are to appear before the altar tomorrow, you and your people along with Aaron.   Each of the 250 men is to take his censer and put incense into it and present it before the altar.  You and Aaron are to do likewise and present your own censers as well."

And so each of them took their censers and placed burning charcoal and incense in them and then stood with Moses and Aaron at the entrance to the Tabernacle.  There Korah gathered all his followers, who opposed Moses and Aaron. 

Jehovah then gloriously appeared before all of them.  He told Moses and Aaron, "Move away from this gang so I can wipe them out in a moment.”

Moses and Aaron prostrated themselves and pleaded, "O God, the god that breathes life into all living creatures, must you vent your wrath upon an entire community when it is only one man who sins?"

But Jehovah told Moses, "Tell all the people to move away from the tents of Korah, Dathan, and Abiram."

Moses got up and went to see Dathan and Abiram.  The elders of Israel followed him, but Moses warned them, "Move away from the tents of these evil men.  Don't touch anything that belongs to them or else you will be destroyed because of their sins."  Thus, in every direction, they moved back from the tents of Korah, Dathan, and Abiram, while Dathan and Abiram emerged and stood at the entrance to their tents with their wives, sons, and small children.

Moses told them, "This is how you will know that Jehovah has ordered me to do these things and that it was not my idea.  If these men die a natural  death, as is the fate suffered by all mankind, then Jehovah did not send me.  But if Jehovah does something unprecedented, if the ground opens up and swallows them and all their worldly goods and they descend alive into the realm of the dead, then you will know it is because they have treated Jehovah with contempt."

No sooner had Moses spoken than the earth beneath their feet split; the ground opened up and swallowed the men along with their worldly goods, as well as the followers who were standing with them and all their possessions.  So they descended alive into the realm of the dead along with their worldly goods.  The earth closed, they perished and disappeared from the community.  The Israelites around them, hearing their screams, cried, "The earth is going to swallow us, too!"  From Jehovah's airship was sent a fiery discharge that incinerated the 250 men who were offering the incense.

Jehovah told Moses, "Tell Eleazar, the son of Aaron the priest, to retrieve the censers from the burnt remains, for they are holy.  Tell him also to scatter the charcoal embers and ashes some distance away.  Take the censers belonging to the men who sinned at the cost of their lives and hammer the metal into thin sheets that can be used to overlay the altar, for the censers have been presented at the altar of Jehovah and have, therefore, become holy.  Let them be a warning to the people of Israel!"

Eleazar the priest collected the bronze censers belonging to those who had been burned to death, and they were hammered into plates to overlay the altar.  This would be a warning to the Israelites that no unauthorized person, no one who was not a descendant of Aaron, may draw near the altar and burn incense upon it, lest what happened to Korah and his conspirators happen to him.  So Jehovah told Eleazar through Moses.

On the very next day, however, the entire Israelite community protested to Moses, "You have caused the death of Jehovah's people!"  But when the rebellious congregation that had gathered turned to the Tabernacle, they saw a cloud covering it and witnessed the glorious appearance of Jehovah.  Moses and Aaron went to the Tabernacle, and Jehovah told Moses, "Keep your distance from this gathering so that I can liquidate them in an instant."  Moses and Aaron, though, fell prostrate. 

Moses told Aaron, "Quickly, take a censer and place burning charcoal from the altar in it, fill it with incense, and take it out to the people so that you can make atonement for them.  Jehovah' wrath has already been kindled and a plague is spreading abroad!”  And so Aaron did as Moses told him, he seized the censer and ran out into the middle of the people who were already dropping dead from the plague.  He burned the incense upon the charcoal and made atonement for the people.  Being all that stood between life and death, Aaron succeeded in stopping the plague.  But, in addition to those who had been killed on account of Korah’s rebellion, 14,700 perished from this plague.   The plague being halted, Aaron returned to Moses at the entrance to the Tabernacle.

Notes
1. Korah and the Levites who follow him are motivated to rebel against the leadership of Moses for two reasons.  Firstly, they believe Moses has assumed dictatorial powers and has claimed an honored position in relationship to Jehovah that they believe belongs to the people as a whole.  Secondly, they object to Aaron and the position of high priest being hereditary, falling only to the descendants of Aaron.  While the Levites have been given special privileges and service in the Tabernacle, no Levite who is not a descendant of Aaron may become high priest.  This seems unfair to Korah and his conspirators.  Korah, though probably spurred by personal motives and petty disgruntlement, can be viewed as an early populist democrat, but he is bucking the concept of hereditary power, which would remain in force through much of the world for the next 3000 years and more.  While the conspirators may have wished for a less centralized power structure -- Moses is pretty much a totalitarian tyrant, even as he is a mere tool and flunky of Jehovah -- they are kidding themselves if they believe that any of them can take his place with Jehovah.  Moses is Jehovah's man, the only human he seems comfortable communicating with directly.  (Why Jehovah is so insecure and unsociable is an open question.)   They seem to be forgetting that while Jehovah has freed them from slavery in Egypt and fed them in the desert (though with the despised manna), he has shown only contempt for his Chosen People.  There is probably more merit in the complaints against Aaron.  There can be no reason why Aaron would be the high priest save that he be Moses' brother.  (Nepotism tends to rub people the wrong way, especially when things are going badly, although it must be pointed out that Korah was Moses' first cousin.)  Aaron couldn't even instruct his own sons in the proper way to serve Jehovah or keep them from officiating while they were drunk.  And Aaron had been quick to give up faith and desert Moses when he was on the mountain, yet he escaped punishment for crafting the Golden Calf.  Aaron's competence and fidelity could certainly be questioned, and if Aaron possessed any admirable traits they are not revealed in the biblical narrative.  It is likely that Moses was blind to the shortcomings and unpopularity of his brother, but his defense of him was in obedience to Jehovah.  The other conspirators, non-Levites, probably had other axes to grind, objecting to the monopoly that Levites had on eligibility for the priesthood -- certainly a legitimate grievance.  Disparaging Moses' leadership, Dathan and Abiram specifically site his unfulfilled promise to bring them to another land flowing with milk and honey.  --- Rabbinical literature has furnished more details and background about this event and its participants, but in such cases one must always ask that, barring some greater access to historical records, why should those writing later know more about an event than those closer to it in time?  How likely to be true are later embellishments and explanations?

2. It may be disappointing to many readers that Dathan, one of the Reubenite conspirators, is such a minor character in the biblical narrative.  In Cecil B. DeMille's 1956 film version of The Ten Commandments, Dathan, memorably portrayed by on-screen gangster, off-screen mensch Edward G. Robinson, is a major villain and the driving force behind the Golden Calf heresy (which, though, is somewhat misconstrued in the movie).

3. Moses calls the bluff of the conspirators and challenges them to a contest that will make known Jehovah's preference, which, Moses knows, is already evident.  Let them all burn incense before the altar to see whom Jehovah will favor.  (Gentlemen, prepare your censers!)  The contest seems absurd since it is not just between Aaron and his cousin Korah, but among 250 other candidates.  How could that many people fit into the Sanctum at one time?  How long would it take for 250 priests to individually make their incense offerings?  Or, if they all burned their incense at one time, wouldn't the resultant smoke and odor from 250 censers be overwhelming?  (It should be remembered that while the altar for sacrifices was located in the Tabernacle compound before the entrance to the Sanctum, the altar upon which the incense was burned stood inside the Sanctum before the Inner Sanctum where the Chest of Sacred Records [Ark of the Covenant] was housed.)  Moses' challenge is predicated on the idea that the deity recognizes the difference between incense being burned by one priest and the same incense being burned by another.  The contest, though, seems merely a devious ruse on Jehovah's part to get all the conspirators together so that he can appear and kill them en masse.

4. Here Jehovah gets to do again what he ostensibly loves best, to murder those who have offended him.  He chooses three separate methods to do so.  Firstly he causes the ground to open up and swallow Dathan and Abiram and their families.  (Are the wives and children guilty, too?)  Then he strikes Korah and his 250 supporters with fire, and, the next day, their 14,700 supporters with some sort of a plague.  Needless to say, there is no natural explanation for the ground to selectively swallow a group of people.  However, what is conventionally translated as "fire from the Lord" is likely an incendiary bomb or missile fired from Jehovah's airship.  The so-called plague presumably involves men dropping dead almost immediately.  This could scarcely be an illness.  What could it be?  Nerve gas?

5. The narrative borders on comic absurdity when we find Aaron running out into the middle of a crowd of people presently dropping dead from Jehovah's "plague" to burn incense and appease Jehovah.  He is successful, but only after 14,700 people have died.  The impression is given that Jehovah, once angered, becomes a violent madman who must be placated, a raging mass murderer whose bloodlust can only be mollified by some silly ritual.  Moses and Aaron must continually try to intervene and plead for the lives of their people whom Jehovah will, in a fit of pique, wantonly and gleefully exterminate without a qualm. 

6. The censers of Korah's 250 would-be priests are collected and the bronze from them used to overlay the Incense Altar.  But, wasn't the altar already finished, earlier in the story?  How could the altar have been a functioning altar, requisitely holy, unless it had been bronzed according to Jehovah's earlier instructions?  It also might be pointed out that surely the bronze from 250 censers would have been far more than what would have been needed for the job.